Group XIII – Diversity Seminar

Diversity Seminar, January 6 – 8, 2010

Written by:
Mike Kornmann, Fellow Group XIII, Community Development Agent, UW-Extention, Burnett County
Carolyn Michalski, Fellow Group XIII, Coordinator, Encore Services for Pre-Retirees & Retirees, Marathon County

It seemed like an oxymoron to go to Appleton, WI for our Leadership Wisconsin Diversity Seminar. What would be less diverse than an elite college town in Wisconsin? And yet, what a surprise we all had as we walked through the seminar experience. Ably led by our seminar chairs, Yvonne Horton and Paul Ohlrogge, our group was encouraged to embrace a broad definition of diversity differences among people with respect to age, class, ethnicity, gender, physical and mental ability, race, sexual orientation, spiritual practice and other human differences and what must be done to see the benefits of diversity.  Introduced to the idea that we are all surrounded by diversity on a daily basis, Appleton turned out to be the perfect place to see how diverse our communities have historically always been and more so how new aspects of diversity are positively impacting the growth of individuals, communities and our state of Wisconsin.

The goal of the seminar was to seek to understand our own cultural history and to better understand those different from us. Speakers on immigration issues and affirmative action helped to broaden our perspectives. Our seminar chairs challenged us through a variety of exercises to develop stronger cultural competencies and concrete action plans to take back to our own communities.

Our small group discussions on our personal stories, upbringings and how they shaped us enlightened us all.  The Diversity Awareness Profile helped us see how we personally approach diversity.  It was an eye opener for most of us and lent to a great deal of discussion and growth in our understanding of ourselves.  The movie “Crash” awakened us all to the hidden biases we all carry.

Perhaps, the highlight of the seminar was our group visits to a variety of people and places throughout the Appleton area which included food pantries, emergency shelters, small businesses owned by new immigrants, faith based organizations, K–12 schools, Lawrence University, U.W. -Fox Valley, and a county government department related to civil rights compliance. Each group came back energized by all they had learned.  Our challenge was then to put our visits and reactions into small plays or creative projects reflecting our experiences.  These were to be presented on the last morning of our seminar.  We were wowed by the impact of the stories presented and came away more emotionally and intellectually aware of how important diversity appreciation is and how much stronger our communities are becoming because of the gift of diversity.

Paul Kaldjian, Professor, UW-Eau Claire, gave us great insight into the benefits of immigration and the positive effects it has on economic growth in states and regions.

Many of our colleagues spoke highly of the article White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack by Peggy McIntosh, Associate Director of Wellesley College Center for Research on Women. The article was a pre-reading that definitely helped us all better understand the “privilege” of being white.  It set the tone for our site visits.  We would encourage everyone to read this article.

We ended our seminar by developing a personal diversity plan of action to carry the learning we experienced back to our own communities.  We shared our plans with a colleague and will check in with each other during the next month to see how we each are doing to make our plan a reality.

The following quote from a Mayori tribe’s person from New Zealand encompasses the challenge of what we learned in our diversity seminar.